The present invention relates to a two-piece apparatus for fixedly holding an Adaptive Optics (“AO”) element in an overall optical system, wherein said AO element may be aligned with respect to said optical system and wherein said aligned AO element may be repeatedly removed and replaced in said optical system without the need for aligning said AO element.
The present invention also relates to a means for spatially aligning the AO element with six degrees of freedom.
The present invention also relates to Micro-ElectroMechanical Systems (“MEMS”) and methods for aligning a deformable MEMS micro-mirror array in an optical system.
Mounting systems for use with deformable mirrors are known. See for instance, U.S. Published patent application Ser. No. 20020097509A1, “Mounting Apparatus for a Deformable Mirror”, to Graves, et al. However, descriptions of systems that provide the means for repeated replacement and interchangeability of a deformable mirror (MEMS or otherwise) in an optical system without the need to realign the system with each interchange are not known.